Woman forbids husband from asking his mother for help babysitting their newborn after she goes back to work, he calls her ridiculous: ‘Figure it out alone’

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Bar Mor Hazut • Senior Editor
Feb 10, 2025 9:00 PM EST

It's funny (and honestly kind of sad) that as soon as a family becomes a family, only one of the parents is usually able to form a connection with their newborn while the other has to go back to work and provide for the family.

Usually, the mother is the one who goes on maternity leave and ends up staying home and taking care of the newest addition to the family. Naturally, the baby and her form a strong connection, which unfortunately leaves the father a little behind on that front. He doesn't get as much quality time with the baby, which can later cause him to be nervous about his ability to take care of the baby alone. And if he never gets the time to do it, how can he actually learn?

For many dads, the only way to learn is by jumping headfirst into the water. After all, it should only take a couple of hours of dad 'babysitting' alone every few days for the connection to fully form. 

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  • That is what the new mother in this story tried to do with her husband and their newborn son. Get dad to take care of the son alone, and everything else will work itself out. This was especially important to mom since she had to go back to work, which meant that her husband had no other choice but to take care of their son alone, and he needed to get over his fears to do so.

    However, he is not thrilled about the idea of being left alone with his own son, so he decides to turn to his mother for help…

  • Cheezburger Image 10466064896
    via SeventyFour

    The image does not depict the actual subjects of the story. Subjects are models.

  • "AITA for telling my husband to figure out how to take care of our son?"

    TLDR; I'm taking a day away from my husband and son to be comfortable with going back to work. Husband has never had a day alone with son so I asked him to try to
    via helloslp
  • figure it out but I'll be available if needed. He told his mother to come and help. I said no. He thinks I'm ridiculous. I (30F) and my husband (33M) welcomed our first.
    via helloslp
  • child this past September. I have been fortunate to be on maternity leave but that ends next week. My husband had 2 months off and has been working full time since. He's off on Sundays and Mondays.
    via helloslp
  • I have never left my son except to go to a wedding in December but we were only away for 3 of his wake hours. My in laws watched over him and everything was fine.
    via helloslp
  • I go back to work next week and my son will be attending day care. My husband is off this entire week and we've just been taking a staycation. I told my husband though I
    via helloslp
  • want one day on my own to get more comfortable from being away from our baby and that I want him to have the day with the baby on his own. He has never been
    via helloslp
  • alone with him for more than an hour. He is a good father though and will help out when needed. But he has never been there for the full blown cries and fussiness while having to take care of the house.
    via helloslp
  • A few days ago, we went to a friends house and our son was screaming bl dy h". Whenever I held him, he would calm down. Whenever my husband held him, he
    via helloslp
  • would just scream and cry even louder. So my husband just passed him along to me. I was getting frustrated cause I just wanted to relax with friends and he couldn't calm him down for a minute.
    via helloslp
  • Today he tells me that his mom will be coming to help out. I asked him to tell her never mind cause he should be able to do it on his own. He called me ridiculous and it shouldn't matter but I think it
    via helloslp
  • really does. I can't be bothered at work unless absolutely necessary so I wanted t this to be our "trial". His mom will also be working on Mondays so it's not like she will be available to help
    via helloslp
  • out then. His mom is taking his side but of course she will cause our son is her only grandson. So AITA for telling husband. to figure it out and step up?
    via helloslp
  • This is my first AITA post and I'm frustrated just writing this so if you need more details to decide, just let me know and I'll respond.
    via helloslp
  • ETA2 - this isn't a punch towards his mother. I adore her. It's really about him being independent with the baby. She helps us and I always appreciate it. Idk why yall think I'm spiteful.
    via helloslp
  • ETA3 When my husband is - home, I do separate myself from them by going to a different room. But he does often come to the room for help. I'm not just dropping him off.
    via helloslp
  • Cheezburger Image 10466065664
    via Arsenii Palivoda

    The image does not depict the actual subjects of the story. Subjects are models.

  • bigbettie-0101 NTA. He is the father of this child and should be able to handle him on his own. Is it just the crying that he can't seem to handle?
    via bigbettie-0101
  • pl487 NTA, but not you're not hearing what he's saying. He's saying that he's not going to do it. You can't physically prevent him from bringing his mom over.
    via pl487
  • RoyallyOakie NTA...He is not even meeting the minimum standard of parenting here. He's the one. being ridiculous and his mother should know better than to enable her son.
    via RoyallyOakie
  • CrimsonKnight_004 NTA - He should be able to be alone with his own child. Of course the baby cries with him, because the baby isn't used to being alone with him. That will gradually lessen as he spends one-on-one time with him.
    via CrimsonKnight_004
  • This really was poor planning on both of your parts, though. You've both had 4-5 months to get this figured out and to get acclimated with the baby. This really should've been happening
    via CrimsonKnight_004
  • already, and he should've already been doing more before this. But hindsight is 20/20. He can't rely on you or his mother or else he and the baby will never get
    via CrimsonKnight_004
  • comfortable with each other. He needs to stop thinking of doing stuff with the baby as "helping out." He's not helping out, he's doing his job as a parent (and you worded it that way too, so maybe you need to stop encouraging the sentiment even if it's only subconsciously).
    via CrimsonKnight_004

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family drama aita baby babysitter kids mother wife reddit story parenting husband babysitting mother in law family Reddit women parents children Father
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